Targeting Ceramide Could Yield New Antidepressants

By Anette BreindlScience Editor

Friday, June 21, 2013

Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, or SSRIs, increase serotonin signaling in the brain, and they have antidepressant effects, at least in some patients. But the latter may very well not be due to the former. Antidepressants take much longer to affect mood than to raise serotonin levels, and there is one antidepressant, tianeptine, which actually increases, rather than inhibits, serotonin reuptake in the brain.